My Entertainment Tracker

Politics IRL

Have you heard what’s going on with the South Korean President Park Geun-hye? It’s sounds like a drama. It could legitimately be a drama. For some reason You’re All Surrounded particularly comes to mind but I don’t remember the drama well enough to put the comparison into words (besides – spoilers).

Update: She’s been impeached and may go to jail like all her other conspirators including “the de facto head of Samsung.” I don’t know what that means but my conspiracy theory is that the exploding Note 7’s came about because they were being lazy with safety laws due to paying off the president. Or it’s just a coincidence.

If you don’t I’ll give you the story off the top of my head. Keep track of all the people involved.

The scandal was discovered because a young lady who won a gold medal in dressage in the 2014 Asia Games used the gold medal to enter a very prestigious university. It does not fulfill the requirements to be able to enter said prestigious university. (I would think a gold medal is impressive enough to help you enter but not as the only requirement but I don’t know the details.) The students were suspicious. (How did they know?) Anyway three semesters pass and this young lady does not attend her classes, she does not do her assignments and she does not even do her exams yet she gets all A’s. One assignment was to design and create an outfit. She handed in a picture of herself wearing branded clothes. The professor ended up doing the assignment for her.

The students and faculty got sick of it and investigated.

Her mother turned out to be a cult leader’s daughter, Ms Choi, whom the Korean media refer to as a ‘shaman fortuneteller’. An investigator got their hands on Ms Choi’s laptop and had a look. They discovered a lot of political and presidential documents such as the president’s speeches with Ms Choi’s edits, the president’s schedule, etc. It was discovered that Ms Choi picks out the president’s outfits (shaman fortuneteller remember). Also what maybe be most important of all – the president convinced chaebols to give Ms Choi’s non-profit companies $70mil which she obviously siphoned off. (I’m really questioning the who, what, when and how of this. Political pressure?) There was too much power given to a non-political person. Way too much power. Is the president just a puppet? A figurehead? Politicians need advisers but you don’t just pick one up off the street, do what ever they say, and convince other people to give your adviser $70mil just because! Who even needs $70mil?

To note: A few months after the news broke, in an attempt to convince the public that she, Ms Park, was still a good president she fired her Prime Minster. Because when you have a scandal obviously firing your subordinates will fix it. It didn’t. The Prime Minister was reinstated(?) as the acting President. He’s a good(?) choice because the Prime Minister before him was fired due to bribery so he’s used to being a stand in for corrupt politicians. Hopefully he isn’t one of them.

Now to continue the story we have to go back in history. Why? Because it’s a Korean drama and there’s always an intricate, well-thought-out backstory.

We go back to 1974(?) when Ms Park is just a young, easily influenced 23 year old woman. Her father, Mr Park, is the Military President (whatever that means) and has been for over 10 years. Someone tries to assassinate him but instead gets his wife, Mrs Park. Mrs Park unfortunately passes away. Ms Park, in her grief, starts receiving letters from a Mr Choi (now why does that name sound familiar…). Mr Choi says he’s been having dreams. He’s been having dreams that Ms Park’s mother has been appearing in his dreams. She was asking him, begging him, to please help and guide her poor daughter who is now without a mother.

Now this Mr Choi is pretty suspicious. He has five (six?) different names! I don’t know what other suspicious traits he had prior to his relations with Ms Park but five names is a good start. Who needs five names? Did he have five different lives? Doing what? Did he have five wives? Was he running from gang members? Was he running from the government? Is it all of the above!?

Ms Park, the poor and lonely soul, befriends Mr Choi. She uses her power as the President’s daughter to fund(?) Mr Choi. Because daughters of presidents have heaps of political power and control. Why and how is this possible!? A few years later (1978?) the President, Mr Park, is assassinated. Now Ms Park has nobody to rely on but Mr Choi. However Mr Choi dies in 1994(?) but not to worry, Ms Choi continues the friendship. Leading to the present day scandal.

I really want to know whether they had a true friendship and Ms Park was corrupt or if Ms Park was being used and taken advantage of… for 40 years… Anyway let’s go back even further in time.

All the protesters. Even celebrities were protesting in their very valuable free time.

Mr Park was the third President of South Korea out of the Korean war. He became the acting President when there was a coup on the second then became the third President. The leader of this coup was the leader of the KCIA (Korean CIA from the Korean war) who was Mr Park’s nephew. That’s Ms Park’s cousin. So many family ties in powerful positions.

Throughout Mr Park’s presidency the KCIA changed leaders and gained lots of power. I’m curious to know what that involved exactly. So I’m assuming when Mr Park is referred to as a military President this is a reason why.

At the attempt on Mr Park’s assassination resulting in Mrs Park’s death I don’t know who killed her or why but I do know that the leader of the KCIA, not Mr Park’s nephew, was the one who killed Mr Park (personally or not, I don’t know). Citing one of the reasons as not reigning in his daughter’s friendship with Mr Choi.

I have many questions here. Is this because of a vast amount of corruption by Mr Park? Was the friendship with Mr Choi bad or very bad? Was it because Ms Park had power she shouldn’t have as just a daughter? Was the earlier attempt on his life by the KCIA too? In which case the friendship with Mr Choi didn’t exist until after. I’m assuming the KCIA and Mr Park helped each other out, that they gave each other power. Was this not the case? Or did Mr Park get more and more greedy? Did the new KCIA leader just have different ideals to the previous leaders? The KCIA had to change their name after this which means it was perceived as bad to assassinate the President. I’m assuming there were secrets only the KCIA knew. I can keep going but I won’t.

Now isn’t this the premise for a great drama!? Do a bit more research than me and fill in the gaps. Answer the questions I had with either truth, lies or embellished truth. Throw in some romance (I think Ms Park has never married but I would assume she’s dabbled in romance at some point in her life). Make it go for a good 16-20 episodes and voila. A very interesting, based-on-a-true-story drama.